Dreams of Goodbye
by EstelRaca
Summary: Apollo dreams in the days following Clay Terran's murder, and in his dreams Clay tries to tell him that everything is still fine. Set at the end of Dual Destinies.


**Author's Note:** This was written for my wife, CatofShades, who wanted to see Clay's ghost comforting Apollo at the end of Dual Destinies.

 _Dreams of Goodbye_

Apollo dreams, and in his dream Clay Terran is still alive.

They are together, talking as they always have, Clay laughing uproariously at a new trick of Trucy's that Apollo is telling him about. Apollo doesn't know why—doesn't _allow_ himself to know why, though the truth burns just on the edge of his memory—but the sight of Clay happy and laughing makes him grin so widely it _hurts_. Throwing his arms around his old friend, he hugs him tight. "I'm so glad you're here, Clay. I'm so glad you're alive and—"

"Except I'm not, Apollo." Clay suddenly looks so sad, sitting next to Apollo on the split-rail fence. He doesn't return Apollo's embrace, though he doesn't pull away, either, instead tilting his head back. The night is dark around them, the sky shimmering with stars as though they were out deep in the forest, camping together as they've done in the past. "God, I'm so sorry. So, so sorry."

"No." Apollo shakes his head, his smile fading as he studies his friend. Sees the bloodstain spreading out across the front of Clay's shirt, and he pulls away as though the red is scalding.

Isn't he allowed to be happy even in his dreams? Isn't he allowed to be safe from hurt anywhere?

"Apollo, no." Clay's fingers touch the red wet blood, then reach out toward Apollo. "No, this isn't what—"

Apollo _screams_ , skittering backwards off the fence as he strives to avoid Clay's bloody hand. Clay is dead, and Apollo is alone, and this is all just a terrible nightmare.

He isn't screaming when he wakes. He is sobbing, instead, and he curls around himself, buries his head in his pillow and waits for the grief to fade enough for him to function.

It doesn't, not really, but he eventually stops crying, and he takes that as his cue to get up and head into work.

He has Clay Terran's mentor to defend, after all, amidst other, more painful decisions to make.

The bandages on his arms chafe, and the patch covering his eye itches, but Apollo tells himself he doesn't care as he makes his way down to the courthouse.

Justice doesn't have time for grief or for pain, and that means Apollo doesn't, either.

XXX

Another night, and this time they are standing in a graveyard, though Clay's body looks whole and healthy.

" _Don't_ you start thinking that way again." Clay frowns, waving a finger at Apollo in admonishment. "Do you know how long it takes to get psychic bloodstains out of ectoplasm? You really want to make me go around looking like some kind of zombie reject in front of the other ghosts?"

He sounds so serious. He sounds so _earnest_ , though there is a slight twitch at the right corner of his mouth and a spark to his eyes that says he isn't, not really.

Apollo starts to laugh, though the sound is harsher, angrier, more hysterical than he would like it to be. "You're _dead_."

"Yeah." Clay sighs, holding his arms out to the side. "Guilty as charged."

"You're dead and Mr. Starbuck's suspected of your murder and my new coworker might have done it instead and this whole thing _sucks_."

"It does, doesn't it?" Clay's right hand rubs up through his hair, leaving the curly mass half sticking up.

"You're..." Apollo draws a slow breath in through his nose. "You're being very calm about this whole thing. Why am I imagining you being calm?"

"You're not." Clay shrugs. "And if it would help anything, I'd scream and cry along with you, but it wouldn't. It'd just result in you waking up, and I... I don't want to give you up until I have to."

"I don't want you to go." Apollo takes a hesitant step towards Clay, though he knows even as he does that he won't be able to reach him. That's how these things work, right? The living can't reach the dead. Death is a one-way bridge, shrouded in mist, impossible to see across, separating the grieving from the lost.

Except he is both grieving _and_ lost, on fire with _fury_ when he isn't too numb with sorrow to feel anything, and he _wants_ to be able to reach Clay, he _wants—_

Arms wrap around him, hold him tight as tears begin to fall again. Not that it matters so much, crying here. No one can tell that you've been crying in your dreams, after all, and Clay was one of the few people who had seen him cry in real life.

"It's going to be all right, Apollo." Clay's voice whispers fiercely in his ears. "You're _fine_. You're always fine, my friend, and you're going to solve this. You're going to live up to that name of yours, Justice."

Another laugh, and Apollo shakes his head, both his hands balled into Clay's jacket. A jacket that _he_ is wearing, when he is awake, the last true connection he has with Clay, and he knows the feel of it intimately. Knows the flaws and the folds and the way it doesn't quite fit him right, having molded itself to Clay's body, and—

"No, don't, please, I want—" Clay's frustrated cry is cut off, and Apollo is left holding only a jacket, still warm with the lingering heat of a dead man's body.

He doesn't wake crying this time. He wakes to numb emptiness, pulls the jacket higher up so that it snugs tight under his chin, and stares into the darkness.

 _She didn't do it_ , Apollo thinks he heard as Clay faded away.

He hopes that his dream of Clay is right. He hopes that it isn't just his subconscious flaying him for doubting the young woman who has been nothing but kind to him since they met eight months ago—the young woman who has seemed as driven and dedicated as he is.

He hopes that he's wrong, but he's seen enough betrayal and corruption now, read enough about it in Phoenix Wright's past cases, to know that he can't turn a blind eye to the possibility.

Athena is lying to him, and Clay is dead, and as soon as the clock shows a more reasonable time than three-something in the morning Apollo will force his stiff body out of the chair where he fell asleep, turn the jacket from a blanket into a cloak, and continue doing what needs to be done.

XXX

Another night, and Apollo doesn't think he will be able to sleep. There are too many emotions tangled too tight around his heart and throat, thoughts with no good ending points running around like toy trains on a looped track every time he tries to close his eye.

Biology is stronger than psychology, though, and it hasn't been all that long since he was caught in an explosion. Not all that long since he was pummeled into unconsciousness. Shame and anger and grief cannot overcome sheer physical exhaustion forever, apparently, and though he doesn't remember when he managed to drift off, Apollo eventually falls asleep.

He dreams, again, and as usual Clay is with him in his dreams.

"You really are fantastic, Apollo." Clay chews thoughtfully on his bottom lip, eyes tilted up, once more, to the stars.

Stars he never actually reached, and even in his dreams Apollo can't escape that reality anymore.

"Please don't get upset. Or... hell, I can't ask that of you. You've got a hundred thousand reasons to be upset right now. But please..." Clay's hand locks tight around Apollo's, as though he could keep him there by sheer force of will. "I want to have some time with you. Some time to talk. To apologize. But it's such a fine line, holding you here but you being aware enough to talk with me, and I don't want to lose you again."

"We've already lost each other, Clay." Apollo runs his thumb over Clay's fingers, the familiar contours pulled easily from memory. How long until he loses this? How long until Clay doesn't look or sound like Clay, fades into a distant memory like any of the half-decent foster families Apollo has had over the years? How long before Apollo substitutes things that aren't true for memories that are fading, and Clay becomes someone else, a fabrication born of desperate need rather than the vibrant, funny, clever man that has helped Apollo over the years?

"I'm so sorry, Apollo." Clay's head hangs in obvious misery, and his fingers tighten to a near-painful degree around Apollo's. "And I'm so glad that you managed to figure everything out. You caught the jackass so that he can't ever hurt anyone again."

"Jackass." Apollo finds himself giving an unexpected bark of laughter. "You _would_ call the international spy and terrorist a jackass."

"Makes sense to me." A brief flash of a smile across Clay's face.

"Right, calling him a donkey makes sense." A shiver runs down Apollo's spine, a twisting, achingly cold contradiction of feelings, a desire to both laugh and cry. "Sure. Why not. But you've got the person who caught him wrong. That would be Mr. Wright."

"He couldn't have done it without you, Apollo." Clay turns so that they're facing each other, taking Apollo's other hand in his. "They're not just saying that. It's really true. But if you want to give your boss credit... guess that means he's a bit more like your childhood hero than you thought, huh?"

"No." Apollo shakes his head, but there's a smile tugging at his lips anyway. "He's still everything I told you last year. A clever fox who thinks it's fun to send me running in circles."

"But who has everyone's best interests at heart." Clay's hands are warm, his smile just like Apollo remembers it. "The childhood hero you knew, just... craftier than he had been. A little more bitter, a little more wary, but just as dedicated to truth and justice and protecting people as he ever had been. Yeah?"

Apollo hesitates for a few seconds before inclining his head with a sigh. "Yeah."

"And _you're_ one of his people, Apollo." Clay's hands tighten again, drawing Apollo's eyes up. "You've got him and you've got Trucy and you've got Athena—"

"Like Athena's ever going to trust me again—"

"She said she would." Clay raises one eyebrow. "She said she _does_. Or are you going to win back her trust by thinking she's lying when you know she's not?"

"You know this is proof that you're not anything other than a figment of my imagination, right?" It is a _good_ imagination, right now, a pleasant imagination, that has sketched in the field where they used to play as children, that has populated the sky with a hundred million stars that Clay could always name in a heartbeat. "You couldn't know about Athena forgiving me."

"Why not?" Another flash of Clay's bright smile. "I'm your friend, Apollo. I'm going to follow you around until I'm sure you're just as fine as ever."

"And what's that _mean_ now?" Apollo tries to keep his tone light, to keep the dark depths of furious grief from ruining this moment, too. "What does being _fine_ mean right now?"

"Whatever it needs to." Clay frees his right hand, reaches out to run it along Apollo's forehead. "Whatever _you_ need it to mean so that you can stop hurting so much."

"I need you to not be dead." Apollo draws a shuddering breath. "I need you to not have lied to me the last few times we talked. I need you to have managed to fulfill your dream. You wanted to touch the stars, Clay, and you _deserved_ it, and it's so _unfair_ that you died like this, here, that you _knew_ despite all the hype that you weren't ever going to make it—"

Clay's finger falls across Apollo's lips. "It's fine, Apollo. It really is. _I'm_ fine, and _you're_ going to be fine, and... everything that you just said, it's what I want to apologize to you for. But I need you to calm down, so that you don't wake up, all right?"

Calm down.

He should be able to do that. He should be able to put the monsters back in the box, push the darkness back down into a tight little ball in his chest. He should be able to forget, for a few blessed moments, that Clay is gone, and that he never got a chance to say goodbye. Should be able to ignore that _he_ twisted the knife for Clay, chattering so happily about how Clay's dream was going to come true, when Clay knew all along that it was likely going to be another sabotaged disaster. He should be able to be _calm_ , because he doesn't want to lose Clay again, even for a little bit, but every time he reaches for calm he just gets fistfuls of anger or loss and he _can't—_

And he is awake, again.

Alone, again.

Staring at the clock on the television, watching the minutes tick slowly forward, and he will need to start sleeping in his bed again now. He will need to start sleeping with a blanket rather than Clay's jacket, especially since he will probably be wearing the jacket to Clay's funeral in two days, at the behest of Clay's father.

Carrying the coffin in which his best friend lies, draped in the trappings of Clay's life, and Apollo squeezes his eyes shut, wills sleep to come.

It does, eventually, but in fits and starts, and he doesn't dream again that night.

XXX

The night before Clay's funeral, and Apollo has Clay's jacket hanging neatly off the closet door.

He forces himself to sleep in his bed. He will need to be rested, tomorrow, if he is to do what Mr. Terran wants him to do. The last thing he needs is to drop Clay's coffin, watch Clay's lifeless body flop brokenly onto the floor in front of a country full of mourners.

His dreams, when he finally drops off, start in nightmares just like that.

The nightmares aren't allowed to hold him for long, though. A hand closes around his wrist, and before Apollo has a chance to decide whether he wants to scream in horror or not they are somewhere else.

Somewhere beautiful.

Somewhere with stars hanging just outside a tiny glass window, and there is no gravity holding him in place, just Clay's arms wrapped around him, Clay's voice whispering in his ear.

"The international space station, Apollo." The thrum of eager energy, of barely-contained glee and desire, burns in Clay's voice, as it always does when he discusses space. "I've _been_ here. All it takes is a thought, a wish, a thread for us to follow, and they're all thinking of the poor little dreamer-boy who wanted to touch the stars and never did. And because of that I _can_."

A disorienting wrench, a tug of Clay's hand, and they are not contained inside the station. They are standing outside it, their feet held by some magic to the surface of the ship, and Apollo remembers, abruptly, that he is dreaming. If he were _not_ dreaming they would be dead, frozen and deprived of oxygen out in the vastness of space.

"Or you'd be a ghost." Clay spreads his arms wide, his head tilted back, turning from the stars to the Earth spread out below them and back again. "It's really not that bad being a ghost, Apollo. At least... not around you guys. Do you know how many spirits your little crew has hanging around you?"

Apollo shakes his head, torn between awe and disbelief and a desperate, yearning ache for what Clay's saying to be true.

"A _ton_." Clay shakes his head, bounding back to Apollo's side. "They're not all very nice—there's this really creepy red-head you should stay away from if you ever end up dancing on the other side for a bit—but overall... it's really not so bad. Mia and Metis and Gregory try to keep everyone safe from the dangerous ghosts, and my mom was there to tell me what was happening, and... well... _look_."

Clay points upward again, to the vast carpet of the milky way glowing above them.

Then he holds out a hand, and Apollo reaches out tentatively to take it.

" _This_ I've done as a ghost." Clay taps the space station beneath them with a foot, gestures with his free hand to encompass the view around them. "But in dreams... well, let's just see what we can do, huh?"

Clay yanks him forward, yanks him up, and Apollo follows without protest

They dance in the milky way, splashing stardust on each other until they glitter with the lights of a thousand suns.

They gather fistfuls of stars like snowballs, and watch them explode on impact.

They dive through the atmospheres of a hundred different worlds, each one more beautiful and unique than the last, and Clay explains where they are in the galaxy, what is known and what is dreamt and what he _hopes_ , above all, to be true.

And when they are done, when Apollo has seen too many wonders to ever remember, they settle on a satellite and watch the moon rise slowly above the earth.

"I wish things had turned out different." There's a wistful, dreamy quality to Clay's voice, though he still feels warm and solid against Apollo's side. "I didn't intend to die, you know. We thought there might be sabotage, I knew the chances of me getting into space were slim, but I never would have imagined... but that's the way it goes, I guess."

"I'm pretty sure most people don't intend to die." Apollo keeps his eyes on the moon, on the wonders that Clay has always loved spread out before them. "And I know you only did what you had to, that you lied to me because you had to, that you didn't want to die, but... I miss you. I miss you so much."

"I know. I can hear it, ever time you think of me. Why do you think I'm here, Apollo?"

"I don't know." Apollo shrugs. "Vengeance? Because you need something? That's the usual reason for ghosts sticking around, right?"

"Well... I guess there are some things I'd like to ask you, if you don't mind." Clay draws a deep breath, and for the first time his composure seems to slip. "My dad... he's all alone now. If you could... I don't know. Be there for him? Do what you can for him?"

"I'll try." Apollo speaks slowly, though a part of him wants to promise anything that Clay desires, swear the sun and the moon to him if only it means that Clay will stay a little longer. "I don't know how... good I'll be at it, though. I'm still such a mess myself... how do I help someone else?"

"The way you've already been helping him, with all the funeral preparation stuff." Clay shrugs. "Just... be there for him. Grieve for me. Keep anyone from... from being nasty to him about how upset he is."

"He just lost his only son." Anger surges through him—always so close, these days, lying just beneath the surface of his composure, a swirling patina that covers less acceptable emotions. "If anyone tries to tell him he doesn't have the right to be or act upset—"

"I know." Clay's hand finds his again, squeezes tight once more. "You'll take care of him, and hopefully he can help take care of you a little bit. Just like you'll have all your family to take care of you."

"I don't—"

"You do." Clay's smile beams out. "You've spent so long thinking you don't need a family that you don't call it that, but... well. Their dead are keeping the dangerous ones away, lending me enough strength to reach you like this. Your family forgave you before you even asked, because they know that you were hurting so badly... because they know that you are, at heart, just like them. A warrior for truth and justice, a defender of the innocent and a scourge for the corrupt, the craven, the... the..."

Apollo's lips twitch. "Can't think of another _C_ word that fits your theme?"

Clay shrugs, and his grin now is his cat-grin of good humor, the one he wears whenever he decides Apollo needs a good teasing. "I'm sure there's a C word that's a synonym for pretty much blatantly evil. But yeah, I'm kind of failing at thinking of it off the top of my head."

"That's all right. Probably best you stop there before you stroke my ego too much."

"I... think it could do with a bit of stroking right now." Clay's hand cups the right side of Apollo's face. "If I could change one thing—"

"It would be not dying?"

"Well, _yes_." Clay glowers at him. "But if I have to die but got to change one _other_ thing, I'd try to keep you from being hurt so much."

"That would have to involve you not dying." Apollo's hand covers Clay's, and his eyes are moist once more, tears threatening along with the gaping hole that had been Clay's presence in his life. "But I'll do whatever you want. Whatever I can to help you rest in peace."

"I know. And all I need, like I said, is for you to keep an eye on my dad." There are tears in Clay's eyes, too, making his gaze glisten as though a galaxy of stars were spinning through it. Leaning forward, Clay presses a kiss to the center of Apollo's forehead. "And take care of yourself, Justice. I'm just fine, and all I want is for you to be fine, too."

It _hurts_.

It hurts so much, a tearing, rending sensation deep in his chest, though he knows there is no physical wound.

It hurts _less_ now, though, than it did before. Or... the hurt is _cleaner_ , less the pulsing, aching threat of a gangrenous wound and more the sharp, stinging pain of a laceration that will heal clean with a few stitches.

Apollo thinks he sees Clay standing in the center of a nebula as he wakes, and Clay's hands are filled with young stars, his grin as familiar as Apollo's own.

It's an image he carries with him through the rest of the morning, as he combs his hair and dons a jacket that has been altered to fit him and prepares to lay his oldest friend to a final rest.

XXX

"It was real."

Apollo starts, looking around guiltily from his place standing just inside the entryway. He needs to keep walking, he knows. He needs to go take his place at Mr. Terran's side, help guide him through the process of letting Clay go. He needs to at least move far enough into the funeral parlor that he doesn't have to hear the crowd that has gathered along the route the funeral procession will take, but for some reason his feet don't seem to want to move.

The woman who spoke to him is beautiful. Her hair is a rich, deep black, and she looks like she's somewhere in her mid-twenties. He clothes are strange, though, some kind of traditional robe with multiple layers like what Maya and Pearl Fey wear, done all in black and dark gray. There is something familiar about her features, though Apollo is certain he's never met her before. Another Fey relative, come to keep Mr. Wright company, somehow finagling her way in past the police barricades? Apollo had understood and even appreciated Pearl and Maya wanting to come for him; he does not like the idea of them bringing someone he doesn't know.

"The dreams you had." The woman's smile is tentative, tender. "That really was him."

"What..." Apollo swallows, resisting his first instinct, which is to lash out at this woman who is speaking about things she can't know. Surreptitiously pinching himself, he tries to ensure that he's really awake. He would know if he's dreaming again, right? He can't wonder if he's dreaming and still be trapped in a dream? He doesn't think so, but maybe...

"Perception and acceptance are the very basic building blocks of channeling. Your talent—" the woman gestures toward his eyes. "Makes you more open than most people not born with the power. It meant that, with a little help, he could reach you when you were most open—when you were on the cusp of dreams."

"I don't—"

The woman holds up a hand. "That's all I wanted to say. Just to let you know that it _was_ real, and he _is_ all right. He's very grateful to you for what you're going to do today, Apollo. For helping his father. For making this funeral about Clay Terran, the man who died, instead of about Clay Terran, the astronaut who never was."

Apollo's right fist is pressed tight to his heart, and he stares through wide eyes at the woman before him. No tells. No tightening of his bracelet around his left wrist. She at least believes that everything she is telling him is the truth.

"He's glad he got some time to speak with you. And even though he likely won't be able to reach you quite so easily anymore, if you ever need to speak with him again, the master of Kurain would happily make sure that you can." The woman walks forward, past Apollo, her every movement full of both force and grace. "The dead don't have to move on until all their connections to the living are severed, and he doesn't plan to go until you're ready."

"He..." Apollo grabs for the woman's shoulder, though he stops just short of touching her. "Is that... that's all right? It's not... dangerous? He's not... he doesn't mind?"

"He doesn't mind." The woman smiles back at him. "He has all the stars that mankind can touch or dream of at his fingertips. Clay's _fine_ , Apollo Justice, and he says that you are, too."

"I'm fine." Apollo nods, pulling his hand back. "I'm Apollo Justice, and I'm _fine_."

The word echoes back at him from the enclosed space of the entry, and Apollo can hear voices hushing inside and outside.

"Thank..." When he raises his head to thank the woman, she is already gone.

Apollo keeps an eye out for her during the entirety of the funeral, but the only people he sees wearing Kurain outfits are Maya and Pearl. Maya's outfit looks very similar to the one the other woman was wearing, but Apollo knows he would have recognized Maya.

It doesn't matter, he supposes, not really.

Clay is fine.

And even though he still hurts more than he ever imagined he could, Apollo thinks, as he takes his place amidst the sea of mourners with Phoenix at his back and Athena at his side and Trucy hugging him tightly, that he really will be fine, too.


End file.
